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Four Strategies To Bounce Back From A Million-Dollar Mistake

CEO of Shapr, the easiest app for building your professional network. Shapr's goal is to make networking a lifestyle.

I got lucky the first time I started a business. I was 24 years old and had an idea for a dating website that would help people connect online. It was 2007, so this was before Tinder or JSwipe. My website, Attractive World, was one of three dating sites that hit the market at the same time, and we quickly grew to one of the top sites in France. It was a combination of the right idea at the right time, the right team and the right time to market.

Fueled by the success of my first company, I became cocky, thinking that I could easily achieve the same level of success in the United States. So in 2014, I hired a CEO to manage the day to day operations of Attractive World, packed my bags and moved to New York to launch my next big idea. I had hustled to build my network of industry mentors, collaborators and investors, and I had witnessed firsthand the impact that a powerful network could bring in building a company. My hope was to build an easier way to network, and from that need, Shapr was born.

I raised $3 million from private investors, many of whom were investors in the first business, and I spent $1 million before the app launched. On launch day, top trade publications including Fast Company, TechCrunch and VentureBeat covered us. We saw a surge in downloads -- and then usage of the app stalled.

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There was no retention, and our organic downloads were capped at 5 people a day.

My heart was crushed. I had wrapped up all my self-confidence in the success of the launch and wasn’t able to separate business failure from personal failure. I spent a lot of time feeling lonely and struggling to regain my confidence, worried that I had let my investors down.

Then it dawned on me -- maybe the problem was not the idea, but the approach. Here's what I learned:

Reassess Your Approach

Our initial app required users to invite 50 existing connections to get started. We thought this strategy would help with growth, but we forgot that were supposed to add value to the lives of our users and solve the actual problem.

When we went back to revisit the product, we also paused all marketing campaigns.

My advice? Try to spend as little as possible until you have a product that works, since the number of downloads is useless if there is no retention.

Talk To Your Intended Users

We built the first prototype of Shapr in a bubble because we were scared of people stealing our idea and beating us to market. Big mistake: I now realize that the chance that someone will take your exact idea and build it the same way is slim, and it is more important to test and refine your ideas.

If you're in a similar business, involve your users from the beginning. To figure out what was working and what we were missing, we reached out our initial users to see if they would share their feedback. I personally spoke with over 150 people and tracked their feedback in a spreadsheet. We used that information to identify trends and repeat feedback to improve the product.

At the same time I talked to users, I went back to our investors and admitted that our launch was a failure. Ashamed, I even offered to give their money back.

Their reactions surprised me. Not only did they refuse to take back the money, many pledged more funds to help us get back on our feet. They made it clear that they had invested in our team and our vision, not just the product. Our investors also stepped in as mentors, connecting talented people to accelerate our relaunch and advising us on the changes we would make to the app. These 100-plus people gave me the energy to believe that we could still turn the company around and make it a success.

If you want to know more about finding the right investors for your project, I shared some tips on LinkedIn about how to find investors who put your values before profits.

Walk Away From Your Product

Finally, don't be afraid to gut or rethink your product entirely.

After reassessing our approach, we ended up scrapping 70% of the initial code -- the equivalent of a year of work and $1 million in startup funds. To do so, we had to navigate the egos of every person who had worked on the initial prototype, including my own. However, we all believed in the mission of the company, which was to make networking a lifestyle.

The second time, we went for a soft launch instead of hiring a press agency. We needed to test new iterations of the product and focus on the numbers instead of the buzz. Each day, we measured downloads, retention and drop-off points. We attracted users through Facebook and Instagram ads, which we found to be the cheapest way to gain enough quality users to test the product.

These experiments paid off -- we now have a radically different app than our initial launch. We get around 2500 downloads a day, 40% of our traffic is organic, and our retention numbers are increasing on a regular basis. Based on the strength of these numbers and our current app, we were even able to raise a Series A this year, bringing our total funding to $16.5 million.

I never expected to be where we are today, and I am proud of everything our team has accomplished with the help of our users, investors and supporters.

The biggest lesson? You should always surround yourself with positive and thoughtful co-founders, investors and users who believe in your vision. You may not land every launch, but if you have a strong team and a mission you believe in, you can and will bounce back.

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